Monthly Archives: June 2012

I am now trying to figure out what I will do in these two days of complete freedom. But first, I have to get my mojo back because I somehow lost it yesterday.

We had our first big meeting yesterday, meeting the boss and all that and we were supposed to introduce ourselves and just talk about what we do and what we like. It doesn’t sound that bad, right? Well, for someone like me that’s horrible. I always mess up my introduction. I always say stupid things and I somehow can’t stop myself from being an idiot.

I hate first introductions. I’m not good at them at all. I never make a good first impression.

I just hate talking about myself in front of other people. OK, you want to know me: here’s my name, I’ll even give you my phone number, just call and talk to me to see what kind of person I am. If you like me, fine. If you don’t, OK. Just don’t expect a good first introduction from me.

I swear I try to say OK things, but there’s something in me that likes saying all the wrong things.

Grrr. So, moving on.

I’m gonna watch some anime, maybe finish Catching Fire, knit and later I will have to learn the stuff I need for work. Yup I have to learn a lot of things.

I am not a person that loves the horror genre. I said this before and I still feel the need to say it again.

For most, Stephen King is synonymous with the horror genre. I made the “mistake” a few years ago and picked up one of his books. I was left feeling sick and uneasy after only a few chapters. Since then I never really dared to read anything else written by him.

But this year I decided to give him another try, mostly because of “The Body” novella.

After finishing the first 3 novellas from “Different Seasons” I decided it was time to read “The Breathing Method“. The last of four novellas, The Breathing Method was probably the most slow paced, scary and for a young woman as myself pretty interesting considering the amount of information about childbirth that was given.

The story revolves around a strange club for gentlemen that get together and share different stories. The club itself is weird and not much is known about the original members or how it was founded. But, even so The Breathing Method is about the stories told in this weird club, and more exactly the story of a young unwed woman who gets pregnant and is determined to give birth to her baby at any cost.

After the story ended, I just sat on the sofa and it struck me how much this author knows about almost everything. Its amazing how Stephen King can take a subject and describe with so much ease and detail. These four novellas are so different in content and in style it is hard to believe they were written by just one person, and yet they are.

I was just ready to close my MP3 player (I have the audio version of the books) when a simple monologue started. At first I wasn’t sure if it was a continuation of The Breathing Method, but then I realized that the author was explaining how these four novellas ended up together in a single book called Different Seasons and how he ended up being branded as a horror author.

I sat there are listened to him (or to the voice of Frank Muller, who I am beginning to think of as the voice of Stephen King) and I felt cheery. That’s not the feeling one might have after listening to a story about a poor pregnant woman that gets decapitated in a car accident.

I was cheered up by Stephen King words and encouragement to “not take shit from anyone“. This all happened when I was still looking for a job and I was going through a rough time, worrying about different things. So, for me this came at the time I needed it the most.

I am still not sure how things like this happen, if they are by chance or they are meant to happen, but I am enjoying them nonetheless.

As for my reluctance to read any horror books, I don’t know if I might try to read other books by Stephen King but then again I don’t even know what I will eat tonight. So who knows, I might give his books more chances from now on.

Science fiction, fantasy and detective books are my favorite. From these 3 genres I read mostly detective books (with Maigret, Poirot, Miss Marple, Sherlock Holmes and so on) and I rarely have time to read anything else.

My last fantasy read was that of The Harry Potter books and I believe it’s been well over a year since I finished the last book of the series. Since then, I tried finding other series that would appeal to me as Harry Potter did.

But then I got stuck reading detective books for a while. I think I still needed time to be able to get over those beautiful wizards and witches.

Last month I started reading The Hunger Games trilogy but I got stuck half way through Catching Fire. I was just tired of having some of my favorite characters killed, beaten or just put in some dangerous situations.

So, I decided I needed something lighter in content and The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien was the only thing that caught my attention.

Actually, I wanted to read The Lord of Rings trilogy but I already started The Hunger Games and I don’t like starting too many books/series at the same time.

The Hobbit is a fantasy novel. It was published in 1937 and since then has been a favorite of many.

I started this book, or better said I tried reading the Romanian version of this book a couple of years ago and I lost interest after the first chapters. I returned the book to the library and just forgot about it until recently.

The fact that it was translated from English to Romanian made me lose interest in it. I recently discovered that the translated version usually looses its charm. So I found the English version, as usual in audio format narrated by Rob Inglis (who does an amazing job by the way).

The story revolves around Bilbo Baggins first adventure.

Bilbo Baggins is of course a hobbit, a respectable one that is, because he never goes on adventures and is very much predictable. But on an “unfortunate” day, the small hobbit gets an unexpected visit from Gandalf, a very well known wizard.

Gandalf is searching for someone with whom he can share an adventure with. Of course, mister Baggins is secretly chosen by Gandalf mostly because of his Tookish ancestors that were known for going on long adventures. But mister Baggins tries to resist and ends up running inside his house.

The next day, mister Baggins is overwhelmed by new visitors: 13 dwarfs and Gandalf as well. They have a small party and at the end of the day mister Baggins is chosen as a companion for their adventure. The 13 dwarfs are looking for a thief that can help them retrieve their long lost treasure of their ancestors that is guarded by a nasty dragon called Smaug.

Poor little Bilbo is somehow roped in the adventure. At first the dwarfs don’t like mister Baggins but they respect Gandalf choice of a burglar. But after a couple of incidents mister Baggins earns his respect as a burglar and a friend among the dwarfs.

The story is really nicely narrated. It took me a couple of hours to finish the book because I couldn’t put my headphones down. It was so easy to just let myself imagine the goblins and dragon, the wogs and the lake men, the dark forest and huge mountains.

I also found it hilarious that a 50 years old hobbit (Bilbo Baggins) will act so much like a child in the beginning but at the end he comes home a completely different hobbit, and a much richer one I might add.

This might be a children’s book but I really enjoyed it.

The Hobbit also shows how mister Baggins comes in the possession of the ring, yup THE ring from The Lord of the Rings trilogy. So, I’m actually happy that I got to read The Hobbit before The Lord of the Rings.

Here I was happy that I was finally moving on to adult books and yet I still come back to children or young adults books. I think my body might be getting old (well, as old as a 25 years old should feel) but my heart and mind are still stuck in my teenage years.

Also, I am actually waiting for the movie to come out. Here’s The Hobbit trailer:

Dare I say the movie looks as good as it can get. I now have another movie added to to-see list.

Hola gringo! Beautiful day we are having. Well it’s barely morning but I’m in such a good mood.

Yesterday it was my first day at work at the new job. It was a full day, even if they allowed us to leave earlier than we were supposed to. I guess in a way they were trying not to scare us. But even so they were really nice and we even got welcome gifts (go figure).

Even my future co-workers are nice. But back to present day, it’s gonna rain. I decided last night that even if I will have to work in the afternoon shift I would still need to wake up in the morning to do all my other stuff. After all time is precious and it would be quite bad for me to waste it now.

So I woke up at 8AM, did some cleaning (including the litter box), checked my emails and made my schedule for today.

But again it’s gonna rain. I would probably appreciate the weather even more if I wasn’t sick. Yup, I got the flu in the middle of summer. This is proving quite a challenge all together because at work they have AC and it only makes my flu worse.

I’m hoping that today they won’t have to use the AC. I need to get better.

And again it’s gonna rain! I love rain and whenever it rains I have one song stuck in my mind: Bonnie Pink – It’s gonna rain.

This always takes me back to those weekend mornings when I used to watch anime. I still can’t believe it was so long ago, yet my memories are fresh as they can be.

Anyway, I hope today will be a good day as well, for me and everyone else.

I don’t know exactly why, but whenever I see the old photos of Marlanu’ I get this fuzzy feeling.

It may be because I did a good deed by taking in a helpless animal. It may be because I finally have my own cat. It might be because this little fellow has grown on me so much. It may be from many other causes. Yet it shocks me when I see the pictures from the first day I took him in. He was so little and cute, and now he is so big and cute.

I wanted to see this movie ever since I got my greedy little hands on the soundtrack. Yup, the soundtrack is probably one of the best I’ve heard so far. I’ve had the songs on my MP3 player since 2009, a bit late considering the movie and the soundtrack were released in 2007.

My favorite song is Bol Na Halke Halke (yet Kiss of Love and Jhoom Barabar Jhoom are pretty close behind):

Even to this day, I didn’t get tired listening to them. They have that rare thing that not many songs have these days: quality!

But lets get back to the movie.

The main actors are Abhishek Bachchan and Preity Zinta, but there’s also Bobby Deol and Lara Dutta.

The story is quite simple: Rikki Thukral (played by Abhishek Bachchan), a fun-loving guy meets Alvira Kahn (Preity Zinta), a beautiful woman. Rikki tries to swoon Alvira but she lies and says she’s to be married soon. Upon hearing this, Rikki quickly defends himself and says he has no intentions on flirting with her because he is also engaged.

And so they end up sharing a table in a crowded coffee shop in Waterloo Train Station, telling beautiful lies about how they both met their imaginary partners.

But after spending some time together they come to like each other and both of them regret lying. And here’s where the fun starts. They try to get in touch with each other but at the same time they try to keep up with the lies they had told. And soon Bobby Deol and Lara Dutta come into picture as their fake partners.

And there’s a lot of dancing and singing, and a nice ending.

The thing I like most about this movie is the transition from the normal action to the songs. The best was by far Bol Na Halke Halke. While the main action takes place in London, the love scenes take place in the beautiful India. The gray buildings were replaced by the beautiful landscapes and it’s just dream like. I am an outdoor person and I really do enjoy things like that, even if the fields of green are just on a screen.

And I always had a soft spot for India.

So, this movie has a beautiful cast (and talented I might add), beautiful songs, lovely story and it was captivating. Believe it or not I watched it in a single try with no breaks, OK maybe a break or two when I had to go to the bathroom. But even so it was worth watching.

This year I had the longest vacation I had in ages. 2 full months! Well, I did had my exams (today was the last one) and I had to look for work, but only good things happened to me.

Where should I start? So many things happened I actually don’t know where to start.

I did well at university. I believe I will pass all my exams; there’s one exam that I am not so sure but overall I did good. I now have to wait for the results to come out. This might take a week or two. But what I enjoyed the most at university is the fact that I actually belong to a group. And they are really nice people. Friends in the making? I hope so.

I also found a job!

It’s something completely different from what I did at my last job but I am feeling confident that things will be OK. The company is pretty big and there are a lot of young people, actually I was feeling a bit old during the first interviews considering I was the only one that was 25 and had so much work experience (5 long years).

I start work on Monday and I am actually anxious. The first 3 months are crucial if I want to keep my job and I really do want this job. I like the workplace, the people there, the main building is right next to the circus and you can see the animals in the park, and the salary is considerably bigger. And I say that comparing the amount of workload I had at my old job and the workload I will have to do here.

The only thing that makes me anxious is the night shift.

I enjoy sleeping and I don’t know how I will manage staying awake during my night shift. But I will tackle things as they come. It’s the best strategy.

Besides work and study, I am enjoying my hobbies as much as I can.

I started knitting a new scarf. I am actually getting good at it and I plan on making scarfs for all my friends and relatives. I finished the first scarf pretty fast because I was listening to audio books. I read The Hunger Games, I am currently half way through Catching Fire and The Hobbit. I think I’ll finish The Hobbit first because it’s “lighter” in content and a bit more cheery than Catching Fire.

I am also sad to say that I slacked with my Japanese lessons. I will have to start all over but I am not bothered by that. This way I’ll see what I remembered and if my learning method has payed off.

Oh and I almost forgot, I love trains!

This was the fourth time I rode the train by myself. On the train I sat next to two Americans that came to Romania to attend a conference and woman that came back from Italy. Those 3 hours have passed so fast and I actually got to practice my English.

It sounds weird but this weekend I survived two of my exams (Macroeconomics and Statistics) and I actually believe I will get good grades considering I had time to finish my test and even help my friends (as much as I could).

I am actually pleased with myself. I still have 3 more exams but I am not worrying about them as much.

What I am actually worrying about is the fact that I’m back to 60 kilos again. I really didn’t noticed till I tried a shirt for an interview. It’s really sad because I am planning on going to the beach next week.

I am guessing stress just got to me and I ate more than I should and I was more lazy than usual. I’ve fallen off the wagon and I now have to get back on it and this time I have to strap myself in.

There is one good thing I am enjoying, the weather is great. It’s nice and cold (for this time of the year).